Antje Ellermann — State against Migrants: The Politics of Deportation in Germany and the United States

State against Migrants: The Politics of Deportation in Germany and the United States
[nggallery id=4]Seminar to be held in ERC 115 at 2:00 pm.

In her talk, which is based on her recent book States Against Migrants, a comparative study of the contemporary politics of deportation in Germany and the United States, Antje Ellermann examines the capacity of the liberal state to make and implement deportation policy. By tracing the politics of deportation across the entire policy cycle—starting with political agenda-setting and ending with street-level implementation— Ellermann is able to show that the deportation capacity of the state systematically varies across policy stages. While the capacity to pass deportation law is contingent upon strong institutional linkages between the public and legislators—allowing for the representation of diffuse interests—the capacity for implementation depends upon the political insulation of bureaucrats. In addition to uncovering variation across policy stages, Ellermann also finds that deportation capacity varies across countries, reflecting differences in political institutions.

Antje Ellermann is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of British Columbia. She teaches and writes on the politics of international migration in advanced democracies, the study of the state and state capacity, and comparative public policy and its implementation. She is the author of States Against Migrants: Deportation in Germany and the United States (Cambridge, 2009). Her research on issues of immigration control, state coercion, and migrant resistance has also been published in Comparative Political Science, Politics & Society, West European Politics, and Government and Opposition. She has been the recipient of research grants by the Social Science Research Council in the United States, and, in Canada, by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.